# I need a good book on WWI **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [April 25, 2005, 12:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-a-good-book-on-wwi/300928 "2005-04-25T00:20:42Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![dangermom](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e274bd/32.png) [@dangermom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dangermom)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2005, 12:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-a-good-book-on-wwi/300928/1 "2005-04-25T00:20:42Z")
I was at the bookstore last night and thought, “hey, I ought to read something on WWI.” Off I went to the right section, and there were 12 books or more on it, of course. So I need some help finding a good fit for me. I have Barbara Tuchman’s books. I’m not big on extremely detailed accounts of battles. I would like a general overview of the war from beginnings to the effects it still has on us all over the world, and information on how and what civilians did as well as soldiers. Please do not limit yourself to what’s now in print. I’m happy to get books from the library, and to interlibrary loan anything they don’t have, so it doesn’t matter much how obscure the titles are. Please help me! ---
**Author:** ![koeeoaddi](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/koeeoaddi/32/408_2.png) [@koeeoaddi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/koeeoaddi)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2005, 12:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-a-good-book-on-wwi/300928/2 "2005-04-25T00:51:33Z")
[Trenches of the Web](http://www.worldwar1.com/reflib.htm) has a reading list I found very helpful when I started researching the First World War. For first person accounts I liked: _Through the Wheat_ by Thomas Boyd, _A Youth in the Meuse-Argonne_ by William S. Triplet _Chronicle of Youth : the War diary, 1913-1917_ by Vera Brittain _Good-bye to All That_ by Robert Graves, and _Tales of the Old Soldiers: nine veterans of the First World War remember life and death in the trenches_ by Tom Quinn The best book ever written of the First World War, IMO, is _All Quiet on the Western Front_ by Erich Maria Remarque. Puts you right in the middle of it. ---
**Author:** ![vl\_mungo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/bc8723/32.png) [@vl\_mungo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/vl_mungo)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2005, 1:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-a-good-book-on-wwi/300928/3 "2005-04-25T01:02:03Z")
I thoroughly enjoyed Tuchman’s Guns of August, but if you are looking for individual stories that include not just the soldiers but civilians as wel… I just finished a brilliant book, [Intimate Voices From the First World War](http://hnn.us/roundup/comments/7235.html), ed. by Svetlana Palmer & Sarah Wallis. It is a great collection of letters and diarys of people from all walks of life, both sides of the war, and from many different cultures… not only do you get the Western Front story, but the Eastern Front as well as the Italian and African theatres. Can’t recommend it highly enough. ---
**Author:** ![HPL](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/3da27b/32.png) [@HPL](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HPL)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2005, 2:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-a-good-book-on-wwi/300928/4 "2005-04-25T02:08:11Z")
> [@koeeoaddi](#): > > The best book ever written of the First World War, IMO, is _All Quiet on the Western Front_ by Erich Maria Remarque. Puts you right in the middle of it. The movie, though, isn’t nearly as good. Too bad. The Nazi Government banned both because they were “Defeatist”. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2005, 3:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-a-good-book-on-wwi/300928/5 "2005-04-25T03:03:19Z")
“[The Price of Glory](http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0140170413/qid=1114398375/sr=1-4/ref=sr_1_4/104-2415610-3902368?v=glance&s=books)” by Alaistair Horne. One of the best military history books ever written. ---
**Author:** ![dangermom](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e274bd/32.png) [@dangermom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dangermom)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2005, 4:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-a-good-book-on-wwi/300928/6 "2005-04-25T04:50:07Z")
OK, thanks so far. I’ll write down the memoirs and letters for a little later; they sound great but I’d like to start with a general overview to get it straight in my head. Keep 'em coming! ---
**Author:** ![Rocketeer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rocketeer/32/4437_2.png) [@Rocketeer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rocketeer)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2005, 1:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-a-good-book-on-wwi/300928/7 "2005-04-25T13:36:00Z")
**The Great War and Modern Memory** by Fussell is a classic. Not so much a play-by-play of the War, but a survey of its lasting effects on western culture. I also enjoyed \*\* Rites of Spring: The Great War and the Modern Age\*\* by Modris Eksteins. **Eyeball Deep in Hell** by Ellis gives you a good idea of just how wretched trench warfare really was. **The Donkeys** , whose author I can’t remember, describes the perfectly awful generalship of the Western powers in searing terms. ---
**Author:** ![Eve](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Eve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eve)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2005, 2:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-a-good-book-on-wwi/300928/8 "2005-04-25T14:11:44Z")
I highly recommend Martin Gilbert’s [The First World War: A Complete History](http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0805047344/qid=1114438453/sr=1-5/ref=sr_1_5/104-9697771-0123148?v=glance&s=books). A readable, well-written overview of the whole war. ---
**Author:** ![yojimbo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yojimbo/32/232_2.png) [@yojimbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yojimbo)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2005, 2:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-a-good-book-on-wwi/300928/9 "2005-04-25T14:21:19Z")
There is a fantastic work of fiction by Sebastian Faulks called [Birdsong](http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0679776818/qid=1114438848/sr=8-1/ref=pd_csp_1/103-4309096-1993453?v=glance&s=books&n=507846) It looks at the horror of trench warfare. The vivid and painful description of The Somme had me in tears at the sheer madness of it all. A great book that left me with some images that will never leave me. ---
**Author:** ![vl\_mungo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/bc8723/32.png) [@vl\_mungo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/vl_mungo)\ **Post date:** [April 26, 2005, 1:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-a-good-book-on-wwi/300928/10 "2005-04-26T01:36:13Z")
> [@dangermom](#): > > OK, thanks so far. I’ll write down the memoirs and letters for a little later; they sound great but I’d like to start with a general overview to get it straight in my head. Keep 'em coming! Actually, the memoirs do a pretty good job of covering the big picture, because in order to put the various entries in the proper perspective, the editors have to fill you in on what’s going on at the time. Otherwise, **The Great War (and The Shaping Of The 20th Century**, ed. Jay Winter and Blaine Baggett is very good. It’s based upon the fine PBS series.